


il mare eterno

by Dickbutt



Series: Dickbutt Writes Again [15]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, Loss, Other, Panic Attacks, Self-Sacrifice, Unhappy Ending, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-26
Updated: 2018-02-26
Packaged: 2019-03-24 01:28:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13800489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dickbutt/pseuds/Dickbutt
Summary: Wherever you goWherever I goMy love lies deep within your lifeMy love remains in your days





	il mare eterno

**Author's Note:**

> Original Request: I feed off angst so could you maybe have a reader x (hanzo, genji, mei, honestly whoever I do not care) where reader is killed during a mission and the overwatch person of choice sees them again months later at a ball as a talon agent? And the reader doesn't remember them or anything about them and like angstangstsss <3 (I hope I worded it clearly...)
> 
> Originally Posted At: [Dickbutt Writes Again](http://dickbutt-writes-again.tumblr.com) on Tumblr.
> 
> And because I'm a monster and can't separate this song from the story, for your suffering purposes: [The title/summary source.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcLjmxout-A) l m a o

The battle was doomed from the start.

A lack of sufficient intel, a smaller-than-average team sent out to investigate what very well could have been a trap – and it was – and before anyone could realize, the Overwatch agents had been vastly outnumbered by the Talon forces, like sharks drawn to the tang of blood.

It felt like a last stand.

Arrows slicing through the wind, Hanzo refused to let it be such. He had found purpose anew in Overwatch, and it would not do to let it fall under such circumstances. Not when he had renewed the relationship he had with his brother; not when he had  _you_  to look out for, and to be watched over in return.

Then Hanzo’s world narrowed to a spray of red mist erupting from a single point on your chest.

You stumbled – gasped – then your entire body folded over and collapsed bonelessly to the ground. Someone other than him screamed for Mercy, which he was thankful for, because he doubted he could get his throat to work, as rapidly as it had dried. He wanted to run to you, but with as hard as Talon was pushing, it would be a greater risk than any to abandon the battle at such a crucial time. So with a single backward glance in your direction, and the medic bent over you, he returned to the fray, dragons howling beneath his flesh for blood, for recompense.

He let them feed.

Every enemy that fell was simply another tick of the clock that marked his wasted time. It was a difficult thing, to ignore the updates in his comm, to block out the sounds of your dying from other people’s mouths when he wanted nothing more than to be at your side – at the end. And it was a difficult thing to know it very well could be the end. And after a time, the comm went quiet, and there was nothing left to ignore.

Perhaps worse, Hanzo was then left alone with his thoughts.

It was a marvel that the dark spiral his own mind had taken did not impact his aim, the very-real sight of your crumpled, bleeding body haunting him behind his eyelids every time he blinked.

The retreat was finally called – better to lose the fight than to have the entire team wiped out.

They fought their way back to the carrier, some certainly more injured than others, and as more of the team was accounted for, Hanzo hesitated. He thought of you, dying –  _dead_  – on the battlefield. Would they really dare to leave you behind? His chest  clenched at the thought, even as he joined the others at the landing zone, Talon closing in. The fight continued on, even there, in defense of their pending escape.

In the distance, the last of the team approached, closing the distance to their way out. Mercy dashed through in her Valkyrie suit, wings aglow, though she did not meet Hanzo’s eye. Ice bloomed outward from his chest – that was it, then. You were gone. And they were leaving you behind, without a word. Without the proper respects. His hand tightened around the grip of Storm Bow, white knuckled to fight the way he started to shake.

And then he saw you.

Significantly slower than you would be uninjured, but you were moving for the carrier, and the angry thought of Mercy having left you by yourself would have been more intense were it not for the immediate relief of seeing you in the flesh which engulfed him. He made to call out, but emotion choked his words away, heart full to bursting. Blood-soaked, but whole, you returned to him.

But hope was always such a fragile, foolish thing. Something in your gait was off, more than just a limp, an inherent wrongness in the way your body moved, like you were fighting against yourself just to remain in motion. Your breathing was labored, beyond mere exhaustion, and flecks of blood still clung to your ashen lips as air rattled through your lungs. Your chest was stained dark where you’d been shot, the armor still shattered around the entry point. He tried not to look for long.

“Go,” you croaked. You hefted your weapon in trembling hands. “I’ll hold them back.”

Hanzo halfway reached for you, but stopped, his hand clenched into a fist. The words he wanted to say again clogged his throat and would not come out; he swallowed against them. His teammates argued in his stead, but you remained, eyes distant and glassy, the grip on your gun alternately tightening and slackening. Mercy looked away – guilty.

“Please,” he managed at last, hoarse and desperate. “Come with us. You don’t have to do this.”

What might have once been a laugh came out a dry wheezing sound and a line of blood ran from the corner of your mouth unimpeded, dripped from your chin. A stark reminder.

“Angela… she bought me some time, but…” You shook your head, and even that motion seemed forced. “I’m, ah… I’m already dead. …You need to go.”

Hanzo barely noticed he had left the platform of the carrier until he saw himself just steps in front of you. The team yelled for him, gunshots echoing from both directions as the fight continued around the both of you, closer by the moment. His jaw was tight as he stared you down, and admitted quietly to himself that your injuries were grievous, that your eyes could not belie the truth that was before him. You stepped forward, closed the brief distance, and pressed your lips to his forehead, the kiss hot and dry against his skin, then suddenly damp. You smiled when you pulled away and Hanzo saw the stains of blood on your teeth.

His shoulders shook – his hand idly went to the spot your lips had touched and the fingers came away red-tipped.

“Hey.” You spoke to soothe him, even as he stared, shell-shocked. “It’s going to be okay.”

He shook his head minutely, eyes narrowed and teeth bared. “I will  _not_  leave you!”

“You  _have_  to,” your voice rasped out.  

You swayed, almost dropped your weapon as you turned away from him to face the approaching Talon forces. Your shoulders squared, and you did not look back. Hanzo called for you again, fought back against the hands pulling at him to return to the ship. The calls turned to screams when his teammates succeeded, and the door of the carrier closed, window on the side giving him a clear view of the enemy that was bearing down on you, how you did not falter in facing your demise.

You did not look back.

Hanzo stumbled to a corner of the ship, curled in on himself, and spoke to no one.

 

* * *

 

It took months for Hanzo to return to even a semblance of himself.

Any attempt to console him fell short, even – if not especially – those from his brother (who stood only as another reminder of his continued failures), and he shut himself away from everyone and everything else, seemingly to deal with it on his own terms. Like all those many months ago, when he had first arrived, he was once again the ghost of the Watchpoint, silent and sullen, seen only when he desired it, rarely speaking.

But when he was alone –

The dragons writhed beneath his flesh, screaming and furious, and he fed them on his own suffering, in an endless feedback loop. He was blind in his fury – at first – blaming the team for their inaction, their disorganization, their weakness; blaming Angela for failing to save you, for not caring enough about you to work the miracle she’d done with Genji. He blamed you…

He blamed you, soft hearted and self-sacrificing, caring too much about everyone and everything but yourself, and reckless until the end.

But most realistically – appealingly, even – he blamed himself, awash with the familiar tang of self-loathing for days at a time, his chest achingly hollow. He relished in the pain, deserving, as always, only deigning to blunt the sharpness of it with sake when it proved too much for even him.

But beyond the pain, there came the nothing. And that was worse than everything which had come before.

He could no longer bear it alone.

It came in inches, first as he crept from his self-imposed exile, then longer still until he was able to speak to others – to interact on any meaningful level other than showing his face to prove that he was still alive. Alive, but not living.

You haunted him in every corner. He saw you in every space you used to fill, heard you in silence, still felt the ghost of your warmth on the other side of his bed. In his nightmares your death alternated with his murder of Genji, sometimes blurring together  so tightly that he woke  sick to his stomach with the dread of having killed you himself, hands slick with your blood.

Days like those were the worst, sent him back to the beginning, to long days curled up underneath his sheets in the dark, trembling, nauseous,  _pained_.

But he recovered – reassembled from pieces. Learned to move forward without you, learned to breathe again without feeling his lungs full of ash and blood. He had his brother, and a place in the world, and though he’d damaged his relationships, he still had his found family in a large portion of the recalled Overwatch members. (Your loss had disturbed them deeply too; he did well to remember that fact.) Days passed, missions came, and life moved forward, even with the shadow you left on his heart.

 

* * *

 

Hanzo had never been particularly attuned to undercover work, but even he had to admit the gala was something of his element – at least as far as his upbringing was concerned. The Shimada had many times hosted similar events, innocuous and beautiful on the surface to hide the shadier dealings and goings on happening right in the middle of things. Their intelligence suggested that Talon had a presence there, whether looking as buyers for some of the available weapons deals, seeking a target, or something else – worse – was uncertain. So Overwatch – small as they were – came to crash the party; it was Hanzo’s first non-reconnaissance mission since… his leave of absence.

He drifted through the crowd with an air of disdainful superiority – something Genji would call his ‘resting bitch face.’ But it kept partygoers at a distance, and those few who were brave or intoxicated enough to approach he dismissed with polite but firm refusals to whatever they came to offer him. He spent the better part of two hours doing circles of the main hall, nursing the same cocktail as he observed the scene.

Though visibly at ease, he was by no means comfortable. There was something that chafed him about the financial and political elite, perhaps because they stirred distant memories of his family, or maybe just that there was little within him that trusted the sort, their presence at a secretly illicit gathering notwithstanding. Beyond that, any number of the people present could have been Talon or Talon-affiliated, which required him to remain constantly vigilant.

And then – a laugh.

It was innocuous, and a sound he had heard many times over the course of the night, but he knew this one more intimately than any, and was ashamed to admit to himself that he’d already started to forget its cadence. His chest pulled tightly, restricting his breathing, and even then his mouth formed the shape of a name long-unspoken.

He was prepared to shake it off, a meaningless reflex of a wound still fresh enough to ache when pressed at, but the laughter formed into words, and he found himself ashamed at the way he strained to listen further. Some disgusting little hopeful thing fluttered about in his chest, despite his firm grasp on reality, and his attempts to crush it. So, he would look, find the speaker and settle this matter before his traitorous –  _irrational_  – emotions could get the better of him. He strode further through the crowd with purpose, determined to put the past to rest. He  _needed_  to.

And then, as though sensing him, the figure turned, another laugh dying on their lips, and made eye contact with him. His world pulled into narrow focus, and he flinched, eyes shut tightly, trying to escape the sight. He counted the seconds in his head, rationalizing, knowing in his heart that what he saw wasn’t real, and when he opened his eyes, there would be someone else standing there, and he could move on. It ached, as all things did, but he knew it was right.

His eyes blinked open, vision returning to focus, but the ghost had already disappeared through the crowd.

Yet all his rationalizations crumbled. Chest still heaving, he ambled on unsteady feet toward a corner of the room and retched into a potted plant, ignoring the few odd looks this garnered him. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, sweat streaking from his temples and mussing his meticulously styled hair, though he cared of little beyond the way his heart spasmed and clenched as though it were primed to explode.

He leaned against the wall, quietly gasping as the room threatened to spin. He was fortunate that no one approached to question his condition; no doubt there were enough people over-imbibing throughout the party that they were paid little mind. He tried to rationalize what he had seen – heard –  _felt_  – but his mind was still in shambles, aching, spinning, overwhelmed.

In an attempt to not draw further attention, he made his way to the nearest restroom to collect himself, and was pleased enough to find himself alone there. The click of his footsteps echoed against the polished floor as he moved on autopilot toward the row of sinks.

His face in the mirror was a wreck, but an unfortunately familiar one. He was pale, clammy; the dark circles under his eyes emphasized by his glassy, bloodshot stare. He splashed himself with cold water from the sink, to wash away the sickly feeling of cold sweat clinging to his skin, then drank down several mouthfuls in an attempt to dull the taste of bile. Afterward, he remained, breathing heavily as he gripped the marble so tightly his arms shook from the effort.

_“Shimada? You alright?”_

The sudden sound of Agent McCree in his earpiece made him jump; his locked-up joints cracked in protest.

“I am –“ He gave a raspy cough, clearing his throat against the lingering burn of acid. He swallowed against another heave, his mouth struggling to form the words. “I am fine.”

_“…You sure?”_ Because even if McCree weren’t a highly-observant ex-black ops agent, Hanzo was blatantly transparent in his weakness. “ _Looked a lil’ rough for a second there.”_

“I am  _fine._ ” He asserted, more firmly, through clenched teeth. He cleared his throat again, some small part of him reveling in the brief sting of pain it brought him. Then, before his mouth could catch up to his reeling mind: “I saw…”

Immediately the stabbing pain returned to his chest, and he clenched his jaw so tightly, so suddenly, that his teeth audibly clacked.

_“Saw what?”_

“I saw…” he trailed off, uncharacteristically hesitant. Did he dare expose this weakness to his teammate, when he had only just been deemed fit to return to duty? Condemn himself to several more months of idle uselessness, left only with his own torturous thoughts?

“I… don’t know what I saw,” he admitted in a half-truth, uncertain and quiet; his mouth had gotten ahead of him again, although he was not incorrect.

There was no possible way he could have seen what he did – it was merely a lingering remnant of his grief, haunting the corners of his mind with the rest of his long-carried regrets.

You were dead. Certain as anything.

_“Listen, Shimada…_ ” He heard McCree sigh.  _“You wanna swap out, give this a break, you just say the word. I know this can’t be easy after – “_

“I will complete the task I was given,” he cut in, with perhaps more force than was necessary. “I am more than capable.”

The comm was silent for several long moments as Hanzo once again made eye contact with the hollowed-out man in the mirror.

_“…Alright. Well. Keep us updated. I’ll be on the lookout from where I’m stationed.”_

McCree left him alone in blessed silence; he sagged until he was hunched over the sink. He gave himself a few more minutes before he returned to the floor, reassembled into the façade of cool confidence. The mission would be completed.

He continued his rounds where he left off, just in time for the third auction of the night to start. He met eyes with Symmetra once, who nodded his way, and saw McCree at the bar – the man raised a glass to him, tipped a non-present hat. His skin prickled under the other Agent’s gaze, and he dreaded that he’d perhaps shown too much weakness to him. But that was a matter for later.

The lights flickered once, for barely a second, just enough.

The auctioneer stared blankly ahead for but a moment, right before his throat bloomed into a ribbon of red and he dropped to the floor, silent. There was a beat, then the room erupted into screaming chaos, the crowd parting in a panicked herd away from the corpse.

The aching numbness gripping Hanzo’s bones thawed away and his nerves thrummed into life. The thrill of action was a welcome reprieve from the hell he’d been internally enduring, and he immediately moved into position. He hefted Storm Bow from its hiding place and awaited his next move as he and the rest of the team checked in on the comm.

_“Looks like Talon’s finally makin’ their move.”_

_“What do we know of their plans?”_ came Symmetra’s smooth tone.

Hanzo moved unnoticed past the chaos, seeking out any obvious sign of disturbance as his fellow agents made plans over the comm. As the cries of the frightened guests below grew distant, there was little he could find obviously out of place or suspicious. Talon was not so subtle in their movements, so where –

An open conference room. Blatant in its incongruence. And the moonlight streaming through the window perfectly silhouetted the blade sliding free from the politician’s neck. He immediately nocked an arrow to fire, but the assailant’s head whipped around, their eyes glowing briefly in the darkness, before they turned tail and ran, his arrow missing its mark. Hanzo sprung forward immediately to give chase – no one could escape a Dragon.

The comm was an afterthought.

“I am in pursuit.”

_“Han – ”_  McCree made a choked off noise.  _“Shimada! Do_ not _engage!”_

But he was already past ignoring the order, body in the grips of muscle memory, comforted by familiar action. It was foolish to assume he was incapable of something so simple as running down a target – even after everything.

_“The team is – **sonovabitch** – !”_

Whatever else was to be said got cut when Hanzo shut off his comm. He didn’t doubt McCree had an eye on him, that he’d had an eye on him the entire evening, but this was something he could more than handle on his own; he did not need a  _babysitter_. Further fueled by his irritation, he shot off several arrows in succession, which either missed or just barely grazed off their body armor.

He had to focus.

The thrill of the hunt reinvigorated him, filling him with fire as his restless dragons urged him toward their prey. Hallways and stairwells blurred by, the only thing in his vision the fleeing figure in black. That they refused to turn and fight was only a sign that they were outmatched and simply running from their inevitable capture or demise.

The antiquated door before him banged open, and only then did he give even a second’s pause before shoving through. If he’d been led into a trap, so be it. He had seen worse odds and come out the victor. But it was not a trap – not obviously – nor an entire troop of Talon foot soldiers that greeted him. It was the wide open night sky, the distant sounds of the city below him, and his silent, hardly-elusive target.

The Talon operative swayed at the edge of the roof, as though debating whether the jump down would be worth avoiding Hanzo’s wrath. They didn’t even turn around at his approach.

He scowled, his teeth bared savagely.

“Unless you intend to leap from this roof, I suggest you face me.”

Knowing they were cornered, his prey turned, fingers still curled around the knife’s handle, and for the first time since the fateful encounter with his brother, Hanzo Shimada hesitated to make a kill.

It was your face staring back at him.

The urge to vomit rose again, but he fought it down, his stomach already emptied once. He choked out your name, barely above a whisper, but there was no reaction, just the impassive glint of unfamiliarity in your once warm eyes – if it was even you. Hanzo’s world tilted.

It wouldn’t be – but he had heard you – your laughter – the knife – the way you moved was all wrong – didn’t you know him?

A throbbing started up behind his eyes, persistent. Was he trapped in yet another of his nightmares?

McCree’s voice barked through the comm, but it was only white noise compared to his pulse thundering in his ears. His grip on Storm Bow faltered, palms slick with sweat, and he shouted your name, desperate.

The thing wearing your face stood still, almost relaxed in its posture – a wicked grin cut across your features, your eyes hooded. He felt helpless, distant from his own body as he watched his arm reach toward you. Whatever it was you said to him was lost over the sound of the Talon transport dropping out of the sky, engines roaring – and the sound of the broken pieces of himself shattering again. You watched him with empty eyes as you left him, escaping into the darkened sky.


End file.
